


Flowers For A Grave

by PS_NoThanks



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Powers, Canonical Character Death, Cemeteries, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Not Canon Compliant, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Peter Parker is a Mess, Prompt Fic, Tony Stark Has A Heart, lasagna
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-19
Updated: 2019-10-19
Packaged: 2020-12-24 02:39:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21092027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PS_NoThanks/pseuds/PS_NoThanks
Summary: This is based off the prompt:Sometimes I steal flowers from your garden on my way to the cemetery, but today you've caught me and have demanded to come with me to ‘make sure the girl is pretty enough to warrant flower theft' and I'm trying to figure out how to break it to you that we're on our way to a graveyard.~~~Peter wasn’t prone to stealing. He wasn’t even a bad kid, usually. Fights were a no, same with talking back - he kind of just kept his head down and made his way through life without disturbing anybody.He just needed to give something to Ben - his uncle deserved so much more than a few measly flowers, but it was all he had.~~~Guess what! Peter steals Tony's flowers, and what occurs next is a terrible misunderstanding, way too much angst, followed by a smidge of fluff, and a hot plate of lasagna.





	Flowers For A Grave

**Author's Note:**

> Hiiiiiiii guys :)  
Please don't be mad. I know I shouldn't post this story when I have a half-finished one in progress right now but I saw the prompt and just couldn't get it out of my head. Also going through some serious writers block for that particular work right now.  
This is just a one-shot that I had to get out of my head, I swear!  
So anyway, I hope you enjoy it :D

Peter wasn’t prone to stealing. He wasn’t even a bad kid, usually. Fights were a no, same with talking back - he kind of just kept his head down and made his way through life without disturbing anybody.

That was just what he had to do, especially now. Aunt May was so stressed, what with work, bills, looking after him, and now…  _ Ben _ . Even thinking of his uncle’s name sent waves of sharp grief through his chest, momentarily stealing his breath. It was still so hard, living in an apartment filled with memories of a man who wasn’t there anymore, so he couldn’t trouble May anymore than he already did. 

The loss was fresh -  _ it _ had only happened three months ago, and it had affected the last dredges of his family in more ways than one. Besides the emotional turmoil, renting an apartment in New York wasn’t cheap, even if that apartment was small, filled with old, moth-eaten furniture and bordered by cracked, peeling walls. 

Now though, with only May’s meager salary as a nurse to live off, things were a bit tight, money-wise, and budget cuts had to be made. 

Peter got his devices from the dumpster, taking them apart and salvaging the parts he could. His clothes were fished out of second hand stores and charity bins, and he sighed as he looked down at his raggedy sneakers. The white of his sock was peeking out from a hole that he’d worn into the toe of the shoe. Packed lunches were a thing of the past, and now he had to stomach the slop that the school tried to pass off as food, despite the fact that it had literally no nutritional value whatsoever. 

So yeah, things were a little tight, but he never complained - He had it better than some people, and Aunt May didn’t need to be burdened with that, especially right now. 

That was why he never told her where he disappeared to on Friday afternoons. Rain or shine, Peter always went  _ there _ \- he needed to visit a few important people in his life, the need to talk to them burning under his skin.

He’d promised May they’d do it together, and he told himself he’d wait for her, as long as she needed - the woman was still working up the courage to go. 

But life rarely went as planned, and so after one particularly bad day at school he had broken his promise to May, and to himself. He just couldn’t wait any longer.

He’d gone to visit Ben.

Halfway there, and his addled mind had realised he didn’t have any flowers to give his Uncle, and his pockets were void of change to buy even a measly bouquet of dandelions. 

That had almost been it. Peter had almost turned back towards home, heart heavy with grief. Ben had been amazing. An amazing Uncle and an amazing person, and he deserved flowers, or candles or just...  _ something _ from his nephew. 

Uncle Ben hadn’t planned on having kids with Aunt May, but when he’d learnt of his brother’s death, and the child he and his wife had left behind, the man hadn’t hesitated to take Peter in. 

Uncle Ben had given him everything he had ( the man’s last gift to Peter had been his life ), and even now, even when he was buried six feet under, Peter couldn’t offer him anything in return. 

And so, as he’d turned around, shoulders slumped and throat thick with unshed tears, an explosion of colour had caught his eye in the dim light cast by the overhead clouds. And there was a garden, meticulously planted and cultivated. Behind it stood a large house, as tidy as the garden laid out before it. The gleaming windows and perfectly-tiled roof spoke of wealth that Peter had never experienced, but that wasn’t what had caught his attention. 

The garden. Vibrant, brimming with life and colour, and the solution to his problem. There were flowers of all kinds; a few that he knew and many more that he couldn't even pretend to try and name. There were so many different hues, one would think it would be a mess, but there was an organised air to the chaos - something elegant and dainty - that made it seem more beautiful in it’s diversity. Surely… no one would miss them if he took just a few.

The plan was forming in his mind before he’d even stumbled the few steps it took for him to get to the fence. 

He knew he shouldn’t. What would Ben think of him? But... it was  _ for _ Ben! Peter wasn’t taking them for selfish reasons - he was just trying to obtain a gift for the father figure that he missed so much. 

And there were so many of the plants, maybe he could even snag some for his parents? He hadn’t known them as well as he’d known Ben, but he still liked to visit them every now and again. 

After a few more seconds of painful deliberation, he reached over the low brick wall that bordered the property and plucked a few of the flowers from the dirt. Peter’s eyes darted to the large house, but there was no movement from inside. No crazy old woman hell-bent on preserving her perfect garden rushed out of the doors and no cranky gardener leapt from the shadows with a rake held threateningly in his grasp. Nothing happened at all, and Peter almost laughed at his own dramatic self. With a small smile, Peter hightailed it away from the huge house, the flowers clutched in his fist. 

That afternoon, he’d talked to Ben, apologised for the dirty origins of the gift he laid at the base of his headstone, and felt lighter, somehow, once he was done. Peter wasn’t bothered by the silence that met his words. Ben had always been a listener, rather than a talker, and finally unbottling all of the emotions that he’d tried to stuff down in the past three months had been oddly cathartic. 

Visiting his parents had been nice, too. Their graves were only a few plots away from Ben’s, because he had always wanted to be buried as close to his brother as possible. 

_ “Being part of a family means you’re part of something real special, Pete. It means you’ll love and be loved for the rest of your life.” _

Peter hadn’t been to talk to his parents in a while, and after  _ Ben _ , well, it had just made it that much harder for Peter to gather up the strength that was necessary to visit them. 

Their weathered graves only served to remind him of how many people he’d lost in his short fourteen years of life. He used to think he was cursed, born with the bad luck of thousands resting on his shoulders, but he’d eventually gotten over that. Death was just another part of life - “the next great adventure” - but despite that, he was terrified that it would come into his life for a fourth time and steal away the last fractured piece of his family. May was all he had left, and if he lost her too… he didn’t know what he’d do.

After that first Friday afternoon, it had become a tradition. Just Peter a handful of stolen flowers on their way to talk to his ( dead, dead, dead ) Uncle. He’d tell May that he was going to build a new lego set with Ned, or that Liz had scheduled an impromptu Academic Decathlon practice, and then he’d make his way to the cemetery, stopping only to take a few flowers from the garden, just as he had done on the first visit. 

Peter hadn’t been caught as of yet, and he’d done it six, soon to be seven times, so he supposed he was pushing his luck. It was only a matter of time before the mystery owner of that house discovered him and his flower-thieving ways.

~~~

School had been bad, but he expected that. Friday was the worst day on his timetable, opening with double Geography, of all things. Why did they need to learn about corn production in Iowa? 

Maths followed, and while he enjoyed the subject, he most certainly did not enjoy the teaching style of Mr Nelson, which really consisted of giving them a chapter of homework each night. 

Then they had science, which Peter would normally look forward to, except they were onto  _ earth science _ \- plate tectonics and whatnot - which was literally the most boring and useless thing he’d ever experienced.

And then the terrible day had come to a terrible close with double gym. 

They played dodgeball. 

Peter, as the main target of Flash and his merry band of hooligans, was mercilessly pummeled by round after round of red balls for an entire two hours. 

Honestly, it was like the P.E. teachers were  _ trying _ to kill him.

As one could imagine, Peter left the school grounds with a healthy dose of relief, only tripping twice and managing to catch his balance both times. The walk to the cemetery was a relatively short one - only fifteen minutes if he didn’t dawdle, and he soon saw the familiar explosion of colour that he had come to associate with the garden.

Peter stopped, and with barely any hesitation, reached out to pick a brilliant yellow flower - Ben’s favourite colour. Without warning, a hand shot out from behind the wall, and strong, calloused fingers wrapped around his wrist, holding it firmly.

Peter yelped, it was a high-pitched, embarrassing noise that forced a blush to rise to his cheeks while anxiety and dread pawed at the walls of his chest. His lungs spasmed as his eyes darted to the owner of the arm holding onto him. 

An expensive looking suit met his gaze, and as his eyes travelled downwards he saw a pair of shiny, leather shoes that looked incredibly out of place on the dirt they were standing on. There was a finely trimmed goatee covering a strong chin, and finally, Peter glanced up timidly to make eye contact with the stranger. 

He was met with a pair of pricey sunglasses that were swiftly flicked up into perfectly-styled hair, revealing dark brown eyes, coloured with mirth. 

The man smirked, accentuating the deep smile lines carved around his mouth. “So, you’re the infamous flower-thief my wife keeps raving about, huh?”

Peter balked, this dude’s wife knew about his stealing? “I’m sorry, sir! I didn’t want to steal your lady’s flowers, I just-just… I don’t have any way to get them someplace else and yours are really colourful and I didn’t think you’d miss them if I only took a few. I promise I’m not wasting them - I’m not even keeping them for myself, they’re for someone else!” he said frantically, the words whizzing out of his mouth like bullets out of a machine gun. May said he had a habit of rambling when he was nervous, and he could certainly say he was nervous now. The stranger didn’t seem to have any trouble keeping up though, and nodded thoughtfully.

“Well, you’re actually stealing  _ my _ flowers. I’ve just never seen you do it until now. My job is more than a little stressful and Pepper told me that gardening helps people to relax after a long day. Imagine my surprise when I came home one Friday afternoon to find a few missing, and then the next week, even more had seemingly vanished!”

“Oh, well, I’m very sorry, sir, I swear! I just… really needed those flowers,” Peter said in defeat, bowing his head.

“Nah, kid, It’s cool. From the looks of it you could do with some free stuff.”

Peter bristled at that. It was true, his hair was ruffled and just long enough to be uncomfortable - he could feel a few of the lengthier locks tickling the nape of the neck as he spoke. None of his clothes were the right size, and he still hadn’t gotten around to asking May for new shoes, so they were even holier than before. He looked poor, and he  _ knew _ that, but he still hated when people pointed it out, and the pity in their eyes as they did so. 

The man seemed to realise that it was a touchy subject, and hastily tried to make amends. “Yeah, ok, I just realised what that sounded like. I’m not great at censoring my words, it drives everyone crazy. Sorry about that, kiddo.” 

Peter nodded his head in acceptance and started to back away, hoping that he wouldn’t get in trouble, though it didn’t seem like he would - by the looks of it, this stranger dude wasn’t very upset with him.

Just as he was about to turn his back and start walking away for real, the man opened his mouth. “Wait! I want to see the fine lady or gentleman that prompted this thievery. I bet you two look real cute together, and you seem like a nice kid, aside from the whole stealing flora from my garden... thing.”   
Peter stood there with his mouth agape, no doubt looking like an absolute bozo. “What?”

“I’m coming with you to meet your mystery man or woman,” the man explained patiently. “What’s your name?”

“P-Peter. Peter Parker,” he stuttered out reflexively, before he froze. This guy thought he was bringing the flowers to someone he was dating? He supposed that wee little misunderstanding was kinda his fault. He did say he was giving them to someone - most people didn’t give things to corpses. How would he break the actual, and much more depressing, news to him?

“Nice to meet you, Peter Parker, I’m Tony Stark. Are you ready? Lead the way,” the man said jovially as he stepped out of the garden. As he stood next to Peter on the sidewalk, rather than raised above him in the flower bed, the boy realised he was almost as tall as the man. While this Tony Stark dude still radiated a confident aura that made him seem at least a head taller than he actually was, Peter felt just a little less intimidated by him now that they were on the same level.

He took a few cautious steps down the street, becoming more sure of himself as Mr Stark followed him easily.

“Mr Stark, I should probably-” Peter began, trying to figure out how to break the news to him, before the older man cut him off.

“None of this ‘Mr Stark’ nonsense, I get enough of that at work and it makes me feel old. I’m only in my forties, ok, that’s not too bad...”

Mr Stark - Tony, as the man insisted Peter call him - talked for the rest of the short walk to the cemetery, and Peter couldn’t get a word in edgewise. He was usually the one rambling, but now, Mr Stark was filling the silence with endless chatter.

Peter learnt that Pepper, Mr Stark’s wife, was the CEO of a big tech company, and that Tony had invented a ton of stuff for her to sell. 

He learnt that Mr Stark preferred the honey and lemon flavoured Strepsils over the orange ones, and absolutely refused to touch the green ones (“What type of medication is  _ green _ ? Nobody in their right mind would ingest anything that’s coloured violently green”). 

He learnt that Mr Stark had several odd colleagues; Steve Rogers, the perfect, golden-haired American, who was Tony’s ultimate frenemy. Thor Odinson, a guy from Norway with muscles the size of Jupiter and a love of Pop-Tarts. Bruce Banner, a usually mild-mannered genius who was prone to the occasional temper tantrum. Clint Barton, an eagle-eyed guy with a sense of humour akin to an eight-year-old’s. And finally, Natasha Romanov, a serious woman who no one with a will to live would ever dream of messing with (though many had tried anyway - Tony and Clint had once put salt in her morning coffee… suffice to say they weren’t ever doing something like that again. They didn’t even get to see her react to it, she just looked at them dead in the eye and chugged the entire thing). 

Apparently, their rapport rivaled that of the squad on Brooklyn Nine-Nine, a feat which Peter found seriously impressive, in his expert opinion. 

Mr Stark talked and talked, right up until the pair turned the corner and the gates of the cemetery came into view. His incessant chatter about the mystery of Tutuankhamen’s death (he’d watched a documentary about it with Pepper last night) was abruptly cut off, and he let out a soft, “oh.”

Peter looked up at him, apologetic. “I did  _ try _ to tell you, Mr Stark.”

“Yeah… that’s on me. I have a tendency to ramble, and when I get going, I rarely ever stop. I’m-I’m really sorry, Pete.”

“It’s ok, Mr Stark. If you, ya know, don’t want to come anymore, it’s fine. I bet this wasn’t quite what you were expecting.”

Mr Stark grunted somberly. “You’ve got that right, kiddo. But I’m committed to this now, so I’m absolutely coming.If that’s alright with you, I mean.”

“Yeah, yeah. I guess it’ll be nice to have someone with me. My Aunt, she - she isn’t quite ready to come by yet, but I just… needed to see them.”

“I understand, kid. Do you mind me asking who  _ they _ are?”

“My parents, they died when I was little so I didn’t really know them, but it’s nice to visit them sometimes.”

“Yeah? I don’t really like to visit mine. Brings up a few too many bad memories for my liking. My dad wasn’t exactly top-notch, and my mum - she tried her best, but she chose him over me one too many times. We fought just before they died.”

“That sucks, Mr Stark,” Peter said empathetically. They walked in silence for a moment, trying their best to avoid looking at the graves surrounding them, before the boy raised his head and continued. “They’re not the only people I come here for, though.”

“Shit, kid, I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine, there’s nothing anyone can do about it now. He is - was, my Uncle. Four and a half months ago he… he died and sometimes I-I just really need to talk to him. So, I come here every Friday.”

“Jesus Christ, you’re so young. You’re just a baby, really. You shouldn’t have to deal with this, kid.”

“I shouldn’t, but I can’t change what happened. Believe me, no one wishes that we had the power to change the past more than me.”

Tony said nothing, instead nodding grimly and wrapping his arm around Peter’s slender shoulders. 

Peter shivered slightly, but not from the cold - the sun was peeking through the clouds and shining a golden light upon the earth, giving it an ethereal glow. Instead, he shivered because cemeteries were always somber places, filled with sadness and grief and the ghosts of those long forgotten.

The old graves were just as depressing to walk past as the new ones. While the new graves held the air of fresh pain and sorrow, they also had loved ones who still remembered them. It was the old graves, the ones covered in moss and mildew, crumbling away into the ground, that leached true misery into the air. They had no one to remember them, no one to grieve for them.

_ They say that you die twice; once when they bury you in the grave, and the second time is the last time that somebody mentions your name. _

Peter reached Ben’s grave, and his breath stuck in his throat. It was still so  _ new _ ; the words carved into the stone not yet faded, and the surface still shiny and polished. 

All of a sudden, everything was just too much. Mr Stark’s hand on his shoulder was heavy, constricting. The air was thick and gelatinous, he couldn’t  _ breathe _ . His shoulders sagged as a sob forced it’s way up his throat and out of his mouth, sounding strangled and broken. 

He immediately clamped his hand over his mouth - he couldn’t  _ cry _ , he wasn’t a  _ baby _ , and he wasn’t alone either. Mr Stark was here, and he definitely hadn’t signed up to witness a grieving teenager fall apart in front of his dead Uncle’s grave.

_ It was just too much _ . It wasn’t fair. Ben hadn’t deserved his fate, and Peter hadn’t deserved Ben. Ben was too good for Peter. The man had been selfless and so, so brave. And his life had come to an end because of Peter.

His knees gave out and he sunk to the grassy ground, trembling minutely. He hadn’t told anyone about what had happened that night - not even the police that had questioned him. Every aspect of the night that led up to the tragedy had been his fault.

Ben and Peter had gone to the corner store for ice cream (which Peter had asked for), so they could eat it during the movie night they’d planned (which Peter had requested). 

The ice cream selection had been dismal, but they’d still managed to find a flavour they could both agree on - cookies and cream. Peter had been in charge of holding the ice cream while Ben paid, and at that moment, with the cold of ice cream container making the tips of his fingers go numb, Peter was happy. Everything was normal, and he felt nothing could go wrong. 

But then, a man wearing a typical bad guy ski-mask had burst into the store, with his gun raised. He’d ordered the poor cashier to empty the register, and Ben had shoved Peter behind some shelves, ordering him to stay there. There hadn’t been a hint of the man that had raised Peter in that second. Ben’s eyes had been bubbling with barely contained terror, and the panic causing the man’s hands to shake where they were gripping Peter’s shoulders seemed to dig it’s way into Peter’s own heart.

But then Ben had been gone, slowly approaching the man with the gun. His uncle had been defenseless, his hands raised in the universally accepted gesture of ‘please don’t kill me, I’m not here to hurt you’.

He’d tried to defuse the situation, and everything had been going as well as it could. Ben was a cop, he was trained in these types of things, but then…

But then…

But then…

But then... Peter had decided to let his blinding fear cloud his brain, and the result had been catastrophic.

Peter had made a break for the door, and the robber had startled, turning on him with the gun raised. What happened next was not like the movies. There wasn’t any climatic music playing in the background and there certainly weren’t any slow-mo shots of the hero jumping in front of a bullet to save the stupid,  _ stupid _ kid.

There was just a bang, a shocked cry, a grunt of pain and then a heavy thud.

The next thing Peter knew, he was kneeling next to Uncle Ben’s prone form, pushing hard against the gushing gunshot wound in his chest and begging for him not to die, to stay. For someone to call an ambulance, to help, _to_ _do anything fucking useful at all_ because his uncle was _dying_ and there was nothing he could do about it and it was _all his fault_.

It was all his fault.

There had been so much screaming that night. The cashier’s scared shrieks as she handed bills over to the masked man, eyeing the terrible weapon glinting in his hands the entire time. Peter’s own, petrified cries as he tried to stop the blood from gushing out of Ben. May’s anguished wails when she saw Peter, hunched over at the police station, covered in rusty, dried blood and the seemingly gaping absence of Ben beside him.

He was jerked back to the present by a gentle hand on his shoulder. Peter blinked hastily, wiping away the dried tear tracks on his face. Since when had he been crying? In fact, when had it gotten so dark? How long had he been at the cemetery for?

_ Shit _ , May would probably be in hysterics. She didn’t like him staying out too late, especially after Ben.

“Hey, kid, calm down. Everything’s alright,” Mr Stark said from somewhere behind him. Peter whipped his head around to see the man’s face hovering above his own, concerned, but not put-out that he’d been forced to stay and watch a teenager fall apart.

“What - what time is it?” Peter mumbled, his lips feeling swollen after his apparent meltdown.

“Uh, I think it’s around five in the evening.”

“What? I’ve been here for two hours? May must be freaking out! And you - oh my god, I’ve made you wait here for two hours, I am  _ so _ sorry-”

“Kid, calm down. I’ve sorted everything out. I called Pepper, who has alarmingly accurate sleuthing skills, and she tracked down your Aunt. Explained the whole thing to her, and apparently they became really good friends in the process? I don’t know how that works. Anyway, you’re in the clear, and don’t even worry about me. You need to feel free to grieve, and I know what it’s like to want to be strong for your loved ones, but you need an outlet. You can’t keep up the facade all the time, Pete. It’ll crack, and then so will you. Bottling everything up isn’t good, and I’m not really one to talk, but you’ve got to share your feelings, even if it’s only occasionally. If I’m the person you want to do that with, it’s fine by me. Hell, let’s make it a regular thing! I can meet you outside my house, and I’ll even bring flowers, sourced solely from my incredible garden. Every Friday sound good to you?”

Peter smiled a little. “Yeah, Mr Stark. Sounds good.”

“Nice. Now your Aunt said you could stay for dinner and I happen to be an amazing chef, when it comes to cooking lasagna that is. Don’t ask me to make anything else. So, what do you say? Wanna meet my lovely wife and have a plate of the famous Stark lasagna?”

“Um, yes please,” Peter said, his small smile turning into a wide grin.

He turned and whispered a swift goodbye to Ben, and then to his parents, before ducking back to Tony. The man wrapped an arm around his shoulders and led him away from the cemetery, down the road and into his home, where Peter met Pepper (who he took a liking to immediately), and then ate the best plate of lasagna he’d ever tasted.

**Author's Note:**

> That's that. Hope you liked it :)  
Feel free to comment or leave kudos because your praise means a lot to me and I love compliments ;)  
If you see any mistakes, please let me know! I couldn't be bothered to edit this as thoroughly as I normally do.  
Thanks for reading, toodles noodles!


End file.
